Arlington, Texas — Just having him back on the mound healthy provided a boost for the Tigers’ injury-wracked starting rotation Tuesday night.
To get 5.2 strong innings out of him, well, welcome back Matt Manning.
“Glad to have him back,” manager AJ Hinch said. “Lot of good and a lot for him to build on, as well.”
Unfortunately, his efforts ended up a footnote as the Rangers rallied for five runs in the bottom of the eighth to beat the Tigers’ 8-3 at Globe Life Field.
Rookie reliever Brendan White, who pitched a scoreless seventh inning, lost a 12-pitch battle against Ezequiel Duran in the bottom of the eighth. White threw a 3-2 sweeper up and in and Duran launched it high and just inside the left field foul pole, breaking a 3-3 tie.
“That one stung a little bit,” said White. “I was able to go back and look at it — I hung it. It was too high. A lot of the others were down and he was just fouling them off. That one just hung up. Just a mistake.”
White seemed to shake off the original sign from catcher Jake Rogers, wanting to go back to the sweeper, a pitch he’d used earlier in the at-bat to get the count even.
“It’s a pitch I had a feeling with, especially that deep into the at-bat. It’s like, what I feel in my hand, what feels hot right now. I just made a mistake.”
The inning quickly went from bad to fatal. An infield single by Marcus Semien kept the inning alive. With two outs, lefty Anthony Misiewicz, just called up from Toledo earlier in the day, was summoned. And it looked like he might end the inning in one batter.
He got Corey Seager to hit a fly ball to deep left field. Kerry Carpenter, who had been inserted into the game as a pinch-hitter, misread the slicing drive and never got to the ball. It hit off the wall for an RBI double.
“It looked like he was tracking it and the ball kept going away from him,” Hinch said.
Nathaniel Lowe plated Seager with a hard single to center. And Adolis Garcia capped the barrage with a three-run homer to dead center field.
Boom, boom, out go the lights.
More: BOX SCORE: Rangers 8, Tigers 3
Manning, making his first start since he broke a bone in his right foot on April 11, soldiered his way into the sixth inning despite some wonky command. Through five scoreless he’d allowed only three singles with two walks.
“It was like that all night — I had great stuff, I’d lose it and then get it back,” Manning said. “Just a little bit of inconsistency. But against a good lineup like that, I’ll take those results every time.”
The Tigers were up 2-0 and Manning was at 73 pitches – the same number of pitches he’d thrown in his final rehab start with Triple-A Toledo. But he finished the fifth getting Seager to hit into a snappy 4-6-3 double-play.
The Tigers’ bullpen had thrown 106.2 innings this month, second most in baseball, so Hinch needed Manning to go as far as he could. Plus, command aside, his stuff was good. Especially his four-seam fastball, which was sitting at 93 mph and hit 97.
“It was the first time I’d gone five innings in about 10 weeks,” Manning said. “But I felt good that he let me go out there (for the sixth). I just wasn’t able to get on those hitters quick enough in the sixth.”
Manning quickly got into the soup in the sixth, walking Lowe on four pitches and then hitting Garcia. Hinch got lefty Chasen Shreve up quickly but Manning had some fight left in him.
He got a ground out to second base, which advance the runners, and then, on his 84th and final pitch, he fired a 97-mph fastball which former Tiger Robbie Grossman lofted to center field for a sacrifice fly.
“I had pretty good velo the whole time,” he said. “Just trying to get those bullets more consistent. But when the situation matches the emotion of it all and I was getting to the end of my outing, it was just let it eat and leave it all on the field.”
Only 47 of Manning’s 84 pitches were strikes. He made it more difficult on himself by working in so many hitter’s counts. He landed just 19 of 35 secondary pitches and didn’t get a single swinging strike with his curveball, slider or changeup.
“There was some good and some bad,” Hinch said. “He still sprayed the ball quite a bit. But he stayed in it and hung in the best he could.”
Manning left with the Tigers up 2-1 and one out still to get in the sixth.
“I really wanted to finish that sixth and maybe go one more for the bullpen,” Manning said. ”
The lead would be vanquished on three softly-struck hits off Shreve. A broken-bat, opposite-field single by pinch-hitter Josh Jung tied the game. Duran his a squibber between the mound and first base for an infield hit. And pinch-hitter Leody Traveras blooped an RBI single to left.
The exit velocity on those three hits were 70.7 mph, 35.7 mph and 75.3 mph. Tough game, baseball.
Spencer Torkelson, who had been in a 2-for-32 scuffle, tied the game with his ninth homer of the season with two outs in the eighth off right-hander reliever Josh Sborz. He hit a line drive inside the foul pole in left, ending a string of 5.2 innings without a hit for the Tigers.
“He’d been grinding,” Hinch said. “He’s getting a scheduled day off (Wednesday). It was nice to see him come back to the dugout happier than he’s been.”
They managed just one brief offensive flurry against lefty starter Martin Perez, who they tagged for six runs in 4.2 innings last month at Comerica Park. They strung four straight singles together in the second inning, which accounted for the two runs.
Miguel Cabrera, who came into the game slashing .360/.433/.540 in his last 60 plate appearances, singled in the first run. Tyler Nevin, just recalled from Toledo on Monday, hit a bullet single (107.6 mph off the bat) to score the second run.
Like Hinch said, there was some good and a lot of things to build on — collectively.
Twitter@cmccosky